Developer: New tower to help show Midland as the ‘Oil Capital of America’

From Staff Reports

Published 9:15 am, Monday, March 18, 2013

Photo: Edmonds International

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Why did ERP choose to develop downtown as opposed to the west and north sides?BradfordThe city and county talked at great lengths about reviving downtown. The building we're in right now (the current county courthouse), we were on the verge of buying 14 acres up on Loop 250 and moving the entire county operation out there onto a campus. And then this building became available and when we put the pencil to it, this made more financial sense and it continues to make us an active member of downtown revitalization. Downtown in Midland is a business community by itself. It is, obviously, largely oil and gas, but it also has IT and government functions. It has a lot of things that are traditional in downtown. A number of cities have started revitalizing their downtown. The best one that comes to mind is Fort Worth. It's a very vibrant, active downtown. Well, we have a head start somewhat. What we have here is downtown office space that is leased up. There is not any big office space. It comes in A, B and C categories, with A being the best. We don't have any A space here. We have a minuscule amount of B space. ... So, the idea of a new office building downtown is attractive to get companies in here. It needs some other items. You hear the city talk about condominiums and such. That would be nice, but again, that's not a call for the county. We just want companies that are active to be in Midland. It is the oil capital of the U.S., certainly. Maybe even more than that.

How so?BradfordWell, technology is driven in that industry by trial and error and by application. The Permian Basin is one of the oldest producing basins in the U.S., certainly the largest producing. So if you're going to try something new in the oil business it's going to stand as to reason you would go where there's more history of the industry. You know, different types of frack (hydraulic fracturing) jobs, different types of pumpjack less

Why did ERP choose to develop downtown as opposed to the west and north sides?BradfordThe city and county talked at great lengths about reviving downtown. The building we're in right now (the current county